#CourtsideCollection: Dallas Artist Kyle Steed Will Unify His Neighborhood Using a Basketball Court as His Canvas

To celebrate Mtn Dew’s arrival in Dallas for Dew NBA 3X, an elite 3×3 basketball tournament in six cities across the USA, Green Label is spotlighting the art, creativity, and culture of DFW.

All stops on the Dew NBA 3X Tour will be accompanied by #CourtsideCollection: a prolific local artist has been hand-selected to curate a custom gallery of up to 150 pieces of artwork submitted on Instagram by artists and fans paying homage to their city.

To have your work considered, enter using the hashtags #CourtsideCollection #Promotion. 18+, Ends 10/23/16, Rules: {bit.ly}

The work of artist Kyle Steed is rooted in simplicity. From his color schemes to his animations, his portfolio of drawings, murals, and mobile photography are consistently simple, elegant, and uncomplicated.

Though he’s not a Texas native, he has proudly adopted the state’s customs and slang words, and now calls Dallas his home. And while he says his city’s art scene leaves much to be desired, it’s that emptiness that motivates him to bring new ideas and artistic contributions to his community.

We tapped Kyle Steed to help us transform a Dallas basketball court into an art piece, as part of our ongoing #CourtsideCollection tour.

What about Dallas inspires your artwork?

This city has been stuck in the past for so long that I often feel like I’m sitting on the sidelines waiting for a new game to start. Honestly, so much of what I see around me feels more stale and recycled rather than fresh. I’m working to bring an original voice to my city. I don’t want to be “the” voice, but I want to be a unique voice in the larger scope of things.

What’s been done is done, and there is nothing original left anymore, but so often I feel like instead of caring about the execution of a thing, people will just do it for a quick buck and then pass on to the next thing. And I feel like that’s the perfect analogy for Dallas. You can see the vacant strip malls and dying suburbs that once were thriving but then people got bored and left. I see it happening all the time. And what history we do have left is quickly being bought up by investors, torn down, and rebuilt. I don’t know how any of that inspires me, but it’s all connected somehow.

How have you watched your art change over the years, and how does change inspire you?

Change is a cycle. A pattern. The only thing constant in our lives. I’ve learned over time to never think that, where I’m at right now in this moment, is it. For me, risking everything on the unknown is the best kind of change I can make. That has played out in many different aspects—joining the military, getting married, leaving my full­time job for more artistic pursuits, and more recently to having children. All of these changes in my life came with my own naive preconceived ideas about change, but now looking back have turned out to be some of the most challenging/beautiful decisions I’ve made.

Everything is connected. I don’t know how everyone else does it, I can only speak for myself, but my life affects my work and vice versa. If anything, as my life has increasingly become more complex and complicated, while my work (from the outside) has grown to be more simplified and reduced. I think there’s something under the surface where I am wrestling with control. To come in my studio and work to control the chaos surrounding me, to block out the noise, and fight for simplicity is one of the major themes in my work right now.

For your installation with Green Label, what inspired the designs?

Diversity. Unity. Imperfections. By embracing our imperfections and our cultural diversity we will grow in understanding of one another and work to unify our neighborhoods. Real change has to happen within us first, then spreads out to our neighbors and friends around us. That is how a real movement begins: with love, truth and understanding.

What sort of impact do you hope to make as an artist?

Ask me again in 30 years. I’m still trying to figure it out.

Check back soon to see Kyle’s finished masterpiece in full. See more of our previous court takeovers here.